REPRESENTATIONS OF AGING AS BOUNDARY SITUATIONS IN EDWARD ALBEE'S DRAMA
Journal Title: Наукові праці. Серія "Філологія. Літературознавство" - Year 2017, Vol 301, Issue 289
Abstract
The purpose of this article is to study the portrayals of late adulthood and processes of aging as liminal conditions in the framework of literary gerontology. The play studies are Sandbox, American Dream, All Over and Three Tall Women. The methods used in the article are mixed: historical data processing, close reading technique, and analyses of interdisciplinary resources (literary gerontology, age studies, age psychology). The author of the paper aims to demonstrate the dynamics of aging of elderly characters despite the outward action-free poetics of the theater of absurd. Albee uses ambivalent models of «the third age»: the senior characters embody features of Otherness, borderland, border between life and death. Yet physical weakness of the elderly dramatis personae is balanced out by their honesty in the conviction of the younger generations of stagnation and loss of human ideals. Intergenerational misunderstanding occurs because of conflicting values. Aging as borderland in Albee’s dramas stem from generational (demographic), cultural (lack of spirituality) and economic (the desire to get rid of the dependents) factors. The paper concludes that representations of aging in the plays by Edward Albee are expressed via intergenerational conflicts, thanatological reflections, memories as the implementation of the concept of «life review» and self-stereotyping of the elderly characters. The results can be practical for the classes of US literature and literary gerontology
Authors and Affiliations
A. V. Gaidash
Keywords
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